The Necessity for Intellectuals

Let us continue our comparison between the function of intellectuals in developing societies and in the West. In developing societies two types are to be found. In one case, as in India the intellectual community exists but its influence is relatively restricted compared with its counterpart in the Western world. ¹ The other is the type where no intellectual community exists. Western literature contains no analysis of the genesis of intellectuals, as their existence and function are taken for granted. Since at least the fifth century B.C. Western society has not been without intellectuals. In ancient Greece, Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, never raised the problem of their own necessity. This was because they lived in a country with an intellectual community and an intellectual tradition. In the developing societies today, the intellectuals have to raise the question of their own necessity. I have tried to argue that they are necessary, but it is not easy to delineate completely the function of the intellectual since we are not dealing with phenomena that can be classified into regular patterns of behaviour. It is not the same as the need for an occupation or a profession, such as that of medicine.